002. text // i say it is, then it's true

[manufactured]

This is another of those questions in which I'm not explicitly asking for details, if you don't care to share them; I've simply found that shouting into a void is useful, if not a productive use of my time. But now that the matter of our souls has been brought into question, I suppose this feels more relevant than it would normally.

As time goes on and you have more and more memories forcibly shoved into your head, do you find yourself having difficulty keeping your thoughts and reactions separate from those of the person whose memories you're recalling? Or to put it a different way, do you ever feel the lines blurring – do you understand things that you previously thought you never would, or do you find yourself relating to things that you suspect you shouldn't?

And if so, has that sort of shift in perception changed what you believe you deserve?

Comments

[insantafe]

It happens more often than I’d like, personally, especially when it involves people here in the city. It makes some things a little more complicated than they need to be. Though I have to wonder just how much worse it'll get the longer this goes on.

[ Jack wouldn’t agree that it’s a blessing when your self-esteem is already rock-bottom, but. It is what it is. ]

I take it your memories have been hitting you pretty hard?

[manufactured]

They have been lately. Most of them are highly unpleasant, though nothing I can't ultimately work through; however, Retrospec certainly isn't helping with their half-shreds of information that they give us in the supposed name of "helping."

No one in my memories seems to be on the app itself, however; I suppose that's a silver lining in some ways, seeing as I can't think of anyone I want to see badly enough to wish all of this on them.

[...That's mostly true, anyway; there are some that he would want to be here if only because this would be weirdly better than anything they were dealing with back home.]

[insantafe]

Count yourself lucky on that one. There’s a couple of folks around here I’ve shared memories with, and that just makes it even harder to figure out where you end and the memories begin.

And yeah, nothing Retrospec’s given us so far has helped even a little bit. It just makes the whole thing that much more confusing.

[manufactured]

To say nothing of concerning, now that they're going on about supposedly keeping our souls more or less intact.

[insantafe]

No kidding. But that part just makes me wonder what happened to everybody else in the memories we're seeing. If they're not around, are they just... gone? Or are they somewhere else out there?

[manufactured]

That's a good question. It's possible some of them are in the city and we just haven't met them yet; an acquaintance of mine just met someone else from his original world after being the only one that he knew of for almost half a year.

[insantafe]

It is a big city. Maybe that's it. Still, assuming they did take us from destroyed worlds or something like that, is that supposed to mean everyone in the city is someone they "saved," or what? Does anyone even know how many people on this network have memories of the same stuff? Because I know not all of us do, which means there could be countless worlds among all of us, right?

[manufactured]

That sounds about right.

I suppose another question is whether we were specifically selected or whether it comes down to random chance, because some of us are...let's say that we're "interesting" choices for those that are supposed to restore a destroyed world.

[insantafe]

I'll say.

[ He has a whole new perspective on it after the mess of last month. But it's because of that he's been more confused about his thoughts and feelings, which are his and which are the other Jack's, so he prefers not to think about it too hard. ]

My guess would be it's all random, given how people seem to drop off and forget everything without warning. If we're to believe the things Retrospec's people have been telling us, they don't have near as much control over what they're doing than we thought... which isn't all that reassuring, if you ask me.

[manufactured]

I'd say it's been apparent since August or so, exactly how little control they have over this situation. Perhaps July, depending on how we're counting it.

[insantafe]

The end of July’s when those monsters first showed up. Did we ever get a real explanation for that, besides this “unreality” crap? That’s as much of a non-answer as I’ve ever heard.

[manufactured]

Oh, of course we didn't. Though I don't know why we expected anything different, given Retrospec's track record.

[insantafe]

And far be it from us to want some real answers after some of us nearly died because of them. You think they’d realize that the longer they keep secrets from us, the less we’re going to trust them if they ever start talking.